


alive

by epsiloneridani



Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, Lone Survivor, implied PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-07-16 12:36:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16086242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epsiloneridani/pseuds/epsiloneridani
Summary: Jun lived. The rest of Noble didn’t.Being alive is about more than just surviving.





	alive

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: implied PTSD

“Tell me about Reach.”

The lights here are too bright, boring into his eyes. Jun blinks, blinks. “That was a three  _month_ campaign,” he snorts. “What  _exactly_  do you want to know?”

The ONI agent blinks at him. Blank. Cool. “What do you remember?”

Kat, falling. Carter, crushed. Emile, gasping and heaving and trying to breathe. Six, silent. Jorge.

Just gone.

“Spartan?”

“I  _survived_.”

It’s so simple to say but something sick turns in his chest with every syllable. The official smiles at him, careful, careful, and Jun gives him a shrug that shooes him and his questions and his clipboard away.

Survived.

Alive.

“I survived,” he whispers to the shadows and the silence. The air’s not cool. He feels so cold.

He blinks and they’re beside him. He blinks and he’s alone.

_—-_

“Spartan-A266 is an invaluable asset. He will be redeployed as a lone operative under the direction of–”

“No.”

The statement is stern, commanding, and stops them cold. Every eye is on Musa Ghanem,  _Musa-096_ , who’s been silent for the first three hours of the proceedings that will decide Jun’s fate.

“Excuse me, Admiral?”

“You heard me.”

Jun doesn’t look up. His hands are folded in front of him, and he looks calm, so calm but for the way he bounces his leg. Restless. So restless. Musa glances at him for half a second.

It’s the most attention anyone’s paid him since the meeting started.

“Jun will not be redeployed,” Musa says. Jun’s head snaps up and Musa looks past the advisor to meet his gaze squarely. “I need him here.”

“Admiral–”

“That’s not up for debate.”

It’s a hell of a long argument but Musa holds his ground, driving them back with steel and a scowl. It reminds Jun of the wolves Kurt showed them when they were training, fierce and unafraid to fight.

Protectors. Guardians.

Musa wheels over beside him when it’s over and the others have shuffled silently from the room. He doesn’t say anything, waiting and asking a question without words.

_What do you think about this?_

Jun’s never spoken to Musa before, never even seen him.

But Musa still fought for him.

“Thank you,” Jun says quietly. Musa extends a hand and Jun hesitates a moment and takes it. His own grip trembles. Musa’s kind enough not to mention it.

“Don’t thank me just yet,” he says, and though there’s sternness to his face there’s also a hint of humor. “I do have a job for you.”

—-

“Do you ever talk about it?” Tom asks quietly one night, when they’re standing on the  _Infinity’s_ observation deck staring out across the shimmering expanse.

Jun glances at him. “About what?”

Tom shifts his weight from foot to foot. Nervous, maybe. Uncomfortable, more likely. Jun’s been told he can have that effect on people. “Reach,” he answers quietly, the same way he might mumble  _Pegasi Delta_  if he could ever force the name past his lips again. “Have you ever…”

“No.” Not to ONI. Not to Musa. Not to anyone. Jun’s voice drops, dripping ice. “Why?”

Tom’s quiet for a long beat. “At least I have Lucy,” he says softly, and he doesn’t say it but Jun knows what he means.

_What do you have?_

“I survived,” Jun says and Tom nods like he believes it.

Like it’s means something.

—-

“Part of me died there, you know.”

Jorge doesn’t answer. Jorge never answers. Of course he doesn’t.

He’s dead.

Jun drops his head into his hands and claws at his eyes. They burn, and he knows it’s because he doesn’t sleep, knows it’s because he doesn’t stop.

“I don’t think I ever really came back,” he croaks. The dogtags are warm in his palm, relics from a box Jorge left behind an eternity ago. If he shuts his eyes he can almost hear the thoughtful  _hmm_ , can almost feel the hand on his shoulder, comforting, grounding.  _I’m here, brother._

The emptiness aches. Jun scrubs at his face, drags his hand over the rough blond scruff on his head. It’s getting long. It needs to be shaved.

He’s too damn tired – too damn tired for anything.

“I don’t think I ever really came back,” he says again, a broken heave. The silence screams.

It hurts to breathe.

—-

“Are you sure about this?”

Jun doesn’t answer, tugging his helmet on. It should be strange to be back in armor after all this time but if anything he feels safer, not suffocated.

“Jun.” Lasky’s voice drops, soft,  _kind_. “I don’t know what you’re hoping to  _find_.”

Jun keys the hatch to the shuttle bay and stands silent for a long beat. Lasky waits. Patient. Always so patient. Like Jorge. A caring leader. Like Carter.

“Captain,” Jun offers at last, “I have to say goodbye.”

—-

He can’t feel the snow through his armor but his entire body is cold.

Glassing plunges a planet into an ice age. Reach is a mutilated morph of its former form, icy ridges and tortured plains. It screams blood and brutality when it used to soothe and save.

It’s the first time he’s glad Jorge isn’t here.

The cliff near SWORD where he left Noble is still intact. If he shuts his eyes Carter’s hand is pressed to his shoulder, Carter’s voice is steel, but whatever he’s saying is muted, gone. The last words Carter ever said to him. The last time he ever saw his brother alive.

Gone.

Jun moves on.

The shuttle hums, so different from the way the Pelican rattled beneath his feet. Jun tightens his grip on the controls and steers through the scored cliffs.

_Noble Leader, you are alarming me._

_You’re on your own, Noble._

_I’m ready! How ‘bout you?_

This is where they died.

Jun lands the shuttle a few hundred feet from the site, well away from the hulking mass jutting out from the snow like a scar. The scanner says the ground is stable but with the way his legs are shaking it doesn’t feel like it.

This is where they died.

The scarab’s hide was thick enough that a convoluted shadow of it survives, twisted and tormented in a frozen death knell. Jun draws his hand into a fist, sets his jaw.

MJOLNIR’s survived worse than a crash into a Scarab.

He crawls inside.

There’s ice clinging to everything and for an instant it’s all just pale blue. Then there’s a flash that tightens Jun’s chest and he drops to his knees to claw to it.

Carter must have dropped his helmet at some point or else had it fly off when he hit the Scarab. Jun hopes he died on impact, hopes he didn’t live long enough to suffocate in the fire. Hopes it was quick. Hopes it was painless. Hopes he didn’t feel anything, just saw flame and flaring lights and then – nothing at all.

Jun stares at the visor for a long moment. It’s cracked, shattered, and crusted with crimson.

This is where they died.

Jun bows his head to the helmet and holds. And breathes.

“Goodbye,” he whispers and it’s like all of the air has been torn from his lungs. The helmet is heavy. He can’t see.

This is where he died.

—-

“Are you all right?”

Jun shrugs. The mess is quiet, more deserted than the observation deck at this hour. “I survived,” he says, and it’s only half wry.

Lasky grimaces, hesitates, and rests a gentle hand on his shoulder. It’s a flash, a brief second, but it means the world.

A caring leader. Like Carter.

“Being alive is about more than just surviving.” Lasky pauses for a beat and even without turning to face him Jun knows he’s searching for the words. “I know what it’s like to watch your friends die.”

Of course he does. Jun’s read his file. “Corbulo.”

“Yes. Corbulo.”

He waits again. Patient. Always so patient. Like Jorge.

“What did you do?” Jun asks a long moment later and he doesn’t mean for it to come out a hoarse croak but one word cracks and the rest collapse. “After?”

“I grieved,” Lasky says. “And then I lived for them.”

He’s there another moment and then gone. Jun barely notices. Reach rumbles through the void, a cruel scar to the stars.

This is where they died.

—-

Musa’s quiet when he gets back but Jun counts the number of times he hears the chair whir by until he has no other choice. “You can come in, you know,” he calls out.

Musa wheels slowly in and Jun rolls his eyes and shoves a stack of paperwork at him. “These aren’t mine.”

Musa blinks at it, once, and ignores him. “How are you?” he asks instead.

There’s apprehension in his voice. Unusual. Jun starts to answer – and then stops cold. “I–”

 _Survived_ tastes bitter on his tongue. Musa waits. Patient. Not like Jorge, he’s more exasperated than Jorge, but still. Patient.

“I’m alive,” Jun says at last. “That’s all.”

It’s the first time he’s ever seen Musa smile.

—-


End file.
